Article

DOCUMENTATION GOES HERE.

GET /api/0.1/articles/Takuji%20Yamashita/

HTTP 200 OKContent-Type:application/jsonVary:AcceptAllow:OPTIONS, GET{
"body": "<html><body><br/>\n<div id=\"databox-PeopleDisplay\">\n<table class=\"infobox\" width=\"200px;\">\n<tr>\n<th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">Name</th>\n<td style=\"text-align:left;\">Takuji Yamashita</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n<th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">Born</th>\n<td style=\"text-align:left;\">1874</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n<th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">Died</th>\n<td style=\"text-align:left;\">1959</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n<th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">Birth Location</th>\n<td style=\"text-align:left;\">Ehime Prefecture, Japan</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n<th scope=\"row\" style=\"text-align:left;\">Generational Identifier</th>\n<td style=\"text-align:left;\">\n<p><a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Issei\" title=\"Issei\">Issei</a>\n</p>\n</td>\n</tr>\n<tr>\n<td colspan=\"2\" style=\"text-align:left;\"><a class=\"external text offsite\" href=\"http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&amp;file_id=2870\" rel=\"nofollow\">More information...</a></td>\n</tr>\n</table>\n</div>\n<div id=\"databox-People\" style=\"display:none;\">\n<p>FirstName:Takuji;\nLastName:Yamashita;\nDisplayName:Takuji Yamashita;\nBirthDate:1874-01-01;\nDeathDate:1959-01-01;\nBirthLocation:Ehime Prefecture, Japan;\nGender:Male;\nEthnicity:JA;\nGenerationIdentifier:Issei;\nNationality:;\nExternalResourceLink:<a class=\"external free offsite\" href=\"http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&amp;file_id=2870\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&amp;file_id=2870</a>;\nPrimaryGeography:Seattle;\nReligion:;\n</p>\n</div>\n<p><a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Issei\" title=\"Issei\">Issei</a> who fought race based bans on citizenship and on land ownership in two landmark legal cases. \n</p><p>Called \"one of the great Asian American lawyers of his generation\" by legal scholar Gabriel J. Chin and \"a pioneer of civil rights\" by Washington Supreme Court Justice Gerry Alexander, Yamashita was born in Ehime prefecture in Japan and migrated to Tacoma, Washington, in 1892.<sup class=\"reference\" id=\"cite_ref-ftnt_ref1_1-0\"><a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_note-ftnt_ref1-1\">[1]</a></sup> Proving to be a quick study, he graduated from Tacoma High School in two years and eventually went on to the University of Washington, graduating from its newly instituted law school in 1902, as one of just ten graduates from its second class. After passing the bar exam, he filed naturalization papers, since the state required lawyers to be American citizens. However, the state did not allow him to practice law claiming that he could not become a citizen because of his race. In response, he filed a brief with the Washington Supreme Court arguing, among other things, that the state accepted lawyers who had passed the bar in other states that did not have a citizenship requirement and also challenging the <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Naturalization_Act_of_1790\" title=\"Naturalization Act of 1790\">1790 naturalization law</a> that limited naturalization rights to a \"free white person.\" On October 22, 1902, the court ruled unanimously against him.\n</p><p>Unable to practice law, he turned to business, opening hotels and restaurants in the Seattle area, while also providing informal legal advice to other Japanese Americans. He married and began a family. He later turned to farming, settling in Silverdale, Washington, where he collided with the law a second time. As was the case with most other western states, Washington passed an <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Alien_land_laws\" title=\"Alien land laws\">alien land law</a> in 1921. To get around the law, Yamashita stated a land company, the Japanese Real Estate Holding Company, that would own the land. When the secretary of state refused to accept the articles of incorporation, he once again turned to the courts. Represented by George W. Wickersham, a former attorney general under William Howard Taft, the case eventually went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1922. In a ruling issued on the same day as the landmark <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Ozawa_v._United_States\" title=\"Ozawa v. United States\">Ozawa v. U.S.</a> decision that definitively designated Issei as ineligible for naturalization, the court ruled against Yamashita once again. He did grow strawberries in Silverdale, Washington, evading the land law by being a \"manager\" hired by a sympathetic white land \"owner.\" \n</p><p>During World War II, Yamashita and his wife were forcibly removed along with all other West Coast Japanese Americans. The Yamashitas went first to the <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Pinedale_(detention_facility)\" title=\"Pinedale (detention facility)\">Pinedale Assembly Center</a> in Central California, then to <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Tule_Lake\" title=\"Tule Lake\">Tule Lake</a> and later to <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Minidoka\" title=\"Minidoka\">Minidoka</a>. Unable to keep up payments, they lost their farm. Upon returning to Seattle after the war, he lived with a daughter and worked as a housekeeper. He and his wife returned to Japan in 1957, where he died two years later at the age of 84.\n</p><p>After having been largely forgotten, interest in his story began anew as the University of Washington Law School prepared for its centennial. Yamashita's story captured the imagination of university media specialist Steven Goldsmith, who featured him in a story in their alumni magazine. Before long, the university, along with the state and Asian Bar Associations, were petitioning the Supreme Court to posthumously admit him to the bar. Before many of Yamashita's descendants, a ceremony on March 1, 2001, did just that.\n</p>\n<div id=\"authorByline\"><b>Authored by <a class=\"encyc notrg\" href=\"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Brian_Niiya\" title=\"Brian Niiya\">Brian Niiya</a>, Densho</b></div>\n<div id=\"citationAuthor\" style=\"display:none;\">Niiya, Brian</div>\n<h2><span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"For_More_Information\">For More Information</span></h2>\n<p>Chin, Gabriel J. \"Twenty Years on Trial: Takuji Yamashita's Struggle for Citizenship.\" In <i>Race on Trial: Law and Justice in American History</i>. Edited by Annette Gordon-Reed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. \n</p><p>Cook, Rebecca. \"Justice for Scholar Comes a Century Later.\" <i>The Seattle Times</i>, Feb. 24, 2001, B6.\n</p><p>Goldsmith, Steven. \"A Civil Action.\" <i>Columns: The University of Washington Alumni Magazine</i> 20.4 (Dec. 2000): 26–30.\n</p><p>---. \"Takuji Yamashita: State's Leaders Honor a Man Once Rejected Because of His Race.\" <i>UW Today</i>, Feb. 12, 2001. <a class=\"external free offsite\" href=\"http://www.washington.edu/news/2001/02/12/takuji-yamashita-states-leaders-honor-a-man-once-rejected-because-of-his-race/\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://www.washington.edu/news/2001/02/12/takuji-yamashita-states-leaders-honor-a-man-once-rejected-because-of-his-race/</a>.\n</p><p>Paton, Dean. \"Posthumous Justice: Yamashita Passes the Bar.\" <i>Christian Science Monitor</i>, March 1, 2001. <a class=\"external free offsite\" href=\"http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0301/p1s4.html\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0301/p1s4.html</a>.\n</p><p>\"Preliminary Guide to the Takuji Yamashita Photograph Collection circa 1880-1957.\" University Libraries, University of Washington. <a class=\"external free offsite\" href=\"http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=YamashitaTakuji5151.xml\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=YamashitaTakuji5151.xml</a>.\n</p><p>Verhovek, Sam Howe. \"Justice Prevails for Law Graduate, 99 Years Late.\" <i>New York Times</i>, March 11, 2001, p. 28.\n</p><p>Wilma, David. \"State Supreme Court Denies Citizenship for UW School of Law Grad Takuji Yamashita on October 22, 1902.\" <i>HistoryLink.org: The Free Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History</i>. <a class=\"external free offsite\" href=\"http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&amp;file_id=2870\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&amp;file_id=2870</a>.\n</p>\n<h2><span class=\"mw-headline\" id=\"Footnotes\">Footnotes</span></h2>\n<div class=\"reflist\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal;\">\n<ol class=\"references\">\n<li id=\"cite_note-ftnt_ref1-1\"><span class=\"mw-cite-backlink\"><a class=\"\" href=\"#cite_ref-ftnt_ref1_1-0\">↑</a></span> <span class=\"reference-text\">Gabriel J. Chin, \"Twenty Years on Trial: Takuji Yamashita's Struggle for Citizenship,\" in <i>Race on Trial: Law and Justice in American History</i>, edited by Annette Gordon-Reed (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 103; Rebecca Cook, \"Justice for Scholar Comes a Century Later,\" <i>The Seattle Times</i>, Feb. 24, 2001, B6.</span>\n</li>\n</ol></div>\n<!-- \nNewPP limit report\nCPU time usage: 0.068 seconds\nReal time usage: 0.074 seconds\nPreprocessor visited node count: 176/1000000\nPreprocessor generated node count: 1104/1000000\nPost‐expand include size: 2412/2097152 bytes\nTemplate argument size: 498/2097152 bytes\nHighest expansion depth: 5/40\nExpensive parser function count: 0/100\nExtLoops count: 0/100\n-->\n<!-- Saved in parser cache with key mediawiki:pcache:idhash:2682-0!*!0!!*!*!* and timestamp 20180116204812 and revision id 16464\n -->\n<div class=\"toplink\"><a href=\"#top\"><i class=\"icon-chevron-up\"></i> Top</a></div></body></html>",
"next_page": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/articles/Wakako%20Yamauchi/",
"prev_page": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/articles/Minoru%20Yamasaki/",
"ddr_topic_terms": [],
"sources": [],
"authors": [
"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/authors/Brian%20Niiya/"
],
"url_title": "Takuji Yamashita",
"categories": [
"http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/categories/People/"
],
"title": "Takuji Yamashita",
"url": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/api/0.1/articles/Takuji%20Yamashita/",
"absolute_url": "http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Takuji%20Yamashita/",
"title_sort": "YamashitaTakuji",
"modified": "2014-08-27T19:21:33",
"coordinates": {}
}